30 years after the introduction of the Sex Discrimination Act, how on earth is this acceptable in 21st century Britain? By a female elected MP, no less.

Labour MP Paula Sherriff was the guest speaker at a sex segregated rally next month hosted by an Islamic extremist who thinks women are “subservient” to men. Sherriff is named alongside Shaikh Sulaiman Gani on the advert, a radical imam who calls women “subservient”, condemns homosexuality and wants justice for al-Qaeda terrorist Aafia Siddiqui, currently serving 86 years in jail for the attempted murder of troops in Afghanistan. Despite it not being a religious event and not being held in an Islamic centre, the poster says there will be “segregated facilities for sisters”. “Sisters” even have a separate phone number to call than male guests.

She has since pulled out, but only thanks to an exposé by Guido Fawkes. The fact that she was even considering it is shocking.

This the same woman who is campaigning against the "tampon tax" for "gender equality". Has she perhaps confused the level of seriousness of the 2 issues? What does it tell our daughters? That they have no more rights but hey, the sanpro is now cheaper, so smile!

Cameron raised this issue on Wednesday at PMQT; - “Let me say this to the Labour party, one thing you could help with: no more segregated political meetings. Let us end the process of having people with bigoted religious views treating women as second-class citizens. I think you should all take a pledge: no more segregated meetings.”

Interesting. One of our local councillors is an Muslim (and Tory). She gets lots of abuse from Muslim men as she holds events with alcohol available (she doesn't personally drink) and won't go to any events that are segregated.

A Labour spokesman again denied that any segregation had taken place. “The Labour party organises no segregated meetings, and segregated meetings are wholly unacceptable,” he said. “If it has happened, then we’ll have to investigate, and tackle that.”

This was on Wednesday. Two days ago.

If there were meetings happening at which Asian or black or disabled people were made to use a separate entrance, on a different street and buy tickets through a separate phone line (my mind implodes at this idea), there would quite rightly be a howling outcry.

So why does labour persist in turning a blind eye when women are treated like shit?

Is it institutionalised sexism that runs rife in the Labour Party? Am I just waking up to it? Or is Corbyn encouraging female apartheid on his watch?

This is not the party I used to put my hopes in. They offer me nothing.

maud I doubt that was the case...a charity fundraiser is hardly the place to have a debate about inequality Surely the reputation of the other speaker should have been a big red flag....surely if you have any nous you don't agree to a public appearance without finding out more first? And Saucy by the look of things she agreed to speak and then pulled out..otherwise the info wouldn't be on a flyer - she could/should have found out more and then refused...not waited until 'guido' highlighted it. And I would prefer an MP of any gender to refuse to address a segregated meeting full stop..as I've just said I hardly think she was using it to take the opportunity to promote gender equality...

Looking at Paula Sherriff's web page she has a post 'Happy International Women's day' that includes Over the last year I’ve had the opportunity to get behind some great campaigns for gender equality. The highlight of these has been my amendment to the Finance Bill which would have forced an EU negotiation on the VAT rate charged on sanitary items, which has been dubbed the ‘Tampon Tax’.It’s good to shine a light on the deep rooted injustice of gender pricing.

That pink van... is that meant to appeal to the ladeeez? Coz that don't work for thissun.

I thought separate entrances went out with those schools which had 'Boys' and 'Girls' over different doors. It's a sort of apartheid. If Whites and Non-Whites having separate entrances is wrong, then so is discrimination by gender. Why would anyone be prepared to speak to a meeting like that?

Why are people assuming that these women were going to hear a balanced view given the description of one of the orators? How do we know that the forum would not just be reinforcing prejudices about a situation and place that they've never visited?

I find the whole idea of segregation absolutely appalling. It's what we hold Rosa Parks up as a paradigm of virtue for railing against.

Would you be saying to Mrs Parks, stop complaining about where you sit, you're lucky you've been let on the bus at all?